a) Field of the Invention
Musical compositions and more particularly live music has been an age-old form of entertainment. Live performances have captured audiences and to date remain a very large and prolific form of entertainment. Live musical performances and recorded music videos or the like present a visual and auditory form of entertainment that ranges from very large concerts to very quaint performances in smaller venues such as local restaurants and pubs.
It is well known that music is one of the auditory art forms ranging in various styles and forms of compositions. Of course there are many forms of musical instruments. In more modern times (modern relative to centuries of music) pop, rock-and-roll, jazz, alternative and various other forms of music are performed live or performed in some form where the musician is visible by way of television, recorded media, etc. Many forms of music utilize common instruments such as guitar, drums and a keyboard. In certain venues of music, the guitar has been a lead instrument and with the advent of music video, the lead guitarist tends to be a center point of captivity for an audience and in the media. Of course various acrobatic performances are perhaps traditionally more conductive with a guitar is normally hung around the shoulder region of the musician. Such classic rock musical bands such as KISS™ have poineered concert performances with various theatrics. Of course the acrobatic nature of artists such as David Lee Roth are very notable. The desire to be physically active while performing with various musical instruments is not only for the benefit of the audience but also very conducive for the musician as he is in the groove of music which he is producing and more particularly is producing with his band members.
The keyboard has a rich tradition in musical history dating back to the Baroque era where many masterpieces in the classical realm of music have been produced with the fundamental principle of a keyboard-like interface. With the advent of new technology, the notes which are represented by each key or replicated electronically and can be transmitted by way of wires or wirelessly to convey sound by way of amplified auditory means. This, of course, drastically reduces the size of the classic piano to a much smaller unit but traditionally, the keyboard is still somewhat larger than other instruments such as the guitar and not traditionally as conducive for allowing movement by the musician.
However, there are many notable performers that have chosen keyboard as their main instrument of choice. Such performers have traditionally been bound by the static nature of the keyboard and not allowed to express their coordinated physical movements by way of dance or other athletic types of movements during a performance.
As described herein, there is shown an embodiment which is to be construed as being broadly claimed in the attached claims to all alternative embodiments as broadly defined where only, of course, one embodiment of the numerous claimed variations is shown herein.
First there will be a brief description of the known background art to date below.
b) Background Art
In general, the background art as discussed below shows various forms of attempting to allow a keyboard or keyboard-like device with some portability. Further, shown out of an abundance of caution are various devices which are adapted to hold portable electronics such as laptops. However, following the detailed description of the enabling embodiment, it can be appreciated that the various benefits are inherent in the claimed functional design.
The first set of background art references generally show supports for electronic items such as laptops.
A second genre of background art references show various devices adapted to support musical instruments that have keys placed on the instrument to create certain frequencies.
With regard to support devices that are related to electronics in general, references such as U.S. Pat. No. 6,772,980 (O'Neill) discloses an erognomic device for a keyboard computer that allows the user to maintain proper posture. Further, U.S. Pat. No. 5,463,925 (Galocy) discloses a split keyboard where as shown in FIG. 2-3. The reference U.S. Pat. No. 5,065,661 (Hacker) discloses a portable keyboard where a handle 4 is provided as shown in FIG. 2 so the musician can hold the keyboard in a horizontal manner.
The following two references deal with the few wireless transmission of sound. U.S. Pat. No. 4,352,310 (Orlandoni) discloses a portable keyboard that has two hollow tubes. FIG. 5 shows accordion buttons that replace the keyboard unit 12 as shown in FIG. 3. Various other embodiments are shown in this disclosure. The reference U.S. Pat. No. 4,099,437 (Stavrou et al.) primarily discloses a remote wireless instrument showing various schematic drawings.
The following prior art references disclose various body structure supports intended to support a keyboard. U.S. Pat. No. 6,137,675 (Perkins) discloses a supportive belt to allow various interfacing type items such as data input keyboards to be attached thereto. The method of attaching the typing keyboards as shown in FIG. 7 is done by way of the hinge body.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,019,264 (Strieber) discloses a support system adapted to have a shock absorbing type system to be attached to a person. The disclosure is directed to support computer paraphernalia. In particular, this reference does show a support to be strapped to a belt, and further, there appears to a linkage like system with the shock absorbers 18 (see the right hand portion of FIG. 1). Apparently, the section 14 is a cushion section and the spring steel wound shock absorber 16 cooperates with the stiff rubber tubes 18 to handle a downward load upon the tray 60 (see FIG. 2). U.S. Pat. No. 4,450,993 (Ephraim) discloses a keyboard carrier where as shown in FIG. 2, the arms are rigidly attached to the belt plate. Further, the shoulder plates are employed as shown in FIG. 1 to add additional support.
The following references further show musical devices where U.S. Pat. No. 4,304,167 (Tait) discloses a rather interesting musical device where in FIG. 4, the support frame 18 is adapted to wrap around the shoulder region of the musician. U.S. Pat. No. 4,126,070 (Hill) discloses a keyboard instrument which is supported by the strap 30. The reference U.S. Pat. No. 3,541,912 (Radke) discloses a guitar-like keyboard were the shoulder strap loop 1″ somehow attaches to the musician. A majority of the disclosure is related to key buttons in the various relay circuits to produce sounds as shown in FIG. 6. Finally the reference U.S. Pat. No. 3,335,629 (Ingemar) discloses a tubelike electrical instrument where the isometricview in FIG. 10 shows a method of using the device. As shown in the various drawings, the shoulder belt is adapted to wrap around the upper portion of the musician.